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June 2, 1973

San Francisco, CA US

Setlist:

Rock and Roll, Celebration Day, (Bring It On Home intro) Black Dog, Over the Hills and Far Away, Misty Mountain Hop, Since I've Been Loving You, No Quarter, The Song Remains the Same, Rain Song, Dazed and Confused (incl. San Francisco), Stairway to Heaven, Moby Dick, Heartbreaker, Whole Lotta Love (incl. Let That Boy Boogie), Communication Breakdown, The Ocean.

Notes:

KRON-TV films a short 16mm newsreel, including clips of the concert.

News Report: 50,000 See Led Zeppelin in Bay City

The British rock group Led Zeppelin drew 50,000 rock fans who paid $320,000 at Kezar Stadium last weekend. Although the 2 ½ hour show Saturday was 6,000 short of capacity, listeners blanketed the football field and stands. Hundreds of others heard the music for free from rooftops in the surrounding neighborhood.

A month ago, Led Zeppelin grossed $309,000 to shatter the Beatles’ mark in 1965. Organizers said the group netted better than $1,000 per minute during the show here. It was the second large rock concert in a week at Kezar. The only casualties reported were some bad drug trips, a broken leg and a security guard accidentally wounded with his own revolver.

More than 250 cars were towed away from illegal parking areas around the stadium, police reported.

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Comments

Submit your personal review of a particular show you attended, updates, corrections, etc., which will be considered for addition to the official online archive.You may also contact the webmaster at: webmaster@ledzeppelin.com

I went with four friends, all of us 16 years old. I don't remember how we got there, but we were some of the first through the door. I remember running, carrying an old sleeping bag to mark our ground. We were 100' from center stage and when we settled down we all dropped acid. As we waited for the opening band frisbees were flying everywhere. People were cool. Everyone was cool. What a huge difference from later concerts where people are so rude. I saw fist fights at a Peter Gabriel concert in the Polo Field in 1988 or so. That was my last big concert. But back to Zeppelin, my first big concert: when The Tubes came on stage they were all dressed in wild clothes. Fee Waybill, the lead singer, was wearing what seemed to be aluminum foil (probably tin foil in those days) and wore boots that never lifted off the stage. They had springs and accordion pleats so that they stretched as he walked. In my acid I thought they were the Devil! They blew me away. They were NOTHING like the clownish party band they later became. They were serious and very, very strange in 1973.

Then everything changed when Lee Michaels came on stage with his Robert Plant hair and cut-off jeans. He was all smiles and happy sunshine. It was a triumphant set and brought me up from hell.

Then some old guy sat on the edge of the stage and sang a song about flying west and how the plane follows the sunrise. I had NO idea who he was and the crowd was not very accepting. So Robert Plant came out and told the crowd that the guy was "the English Bob Dylan" and then we listened a little more quietly, but not much. I learned much later that the old guy was the great Roy Harper. I should have paid attention.

Then a long time and more acid and more frisbees and joints passing in all directions. People were cool. Everyone was so cool and friendly and smiling and happy and peaceful and passing joints.

And then the stage crew started testing the sound system for Led Zeppelin. They played a new Stevie Wonder song over and over and over. The song was "Big Brother" and I didn't hear it again for 30 years. It's playing now as I write this. It was LOUD and beautiful at Kezar in 1973. So beautiful, that harmonica.

OK, here is how I recall the sound system. I don't know how much of this is real and how much was acid and joy. It was an array of speakers mounted on towers about 50 feet high. There were hundreds of speakers. And the towers pivoted left and right so that the sound could be swept across the crowd. When it swept past me it made my bones vibrate. I can still feel that strange sensation. "Your name is Big Brother, you say that you're watching me on the telly, seeing me going no where..." Oh Stevie!

And then there was clapping and shouting and "there's Jimmy!" and he was walking around the back of the stage is a bright white jump suit. And then Robert Plant walked over to stage left and took some photos on a 35mm camera.

And then the show started and it was, yeah, it was. My friends and I left before the final song. But as we rode the city bus to the foot of the Bay Bridge to hitchhike home we could hear the music for what seemed to be miles. It must have been one of the loudest shows ever played. We were still rocking on the bus with the windows down and full of cool people. Everyone was cool.